I was thinking that if Voyager was made in the 50s, that all the aliens and half the crew would be smoking... There would be ash trays all over the bridge flying this way and that into the side of the bridge crews skulls... Which is when I wondered if Roddenberry had something against smoking since the only person I recall, not that I can remeber most of everything I once paid attention to, smoking ever in Star Trek was Iman in the Undiscovered Country.

ENT used smoke a lot. One of the bloopers (from THe Expanse I think) has Bakula hitting his mark and cracking up because the smoke is so thick he can barely see, adlibbing "That's right men, next year fire extinguishers for everybody."

I happen to be a fan of both Neelix and Kes and enjoyed their relationship, which was actually handled rather well in spite of the discrepancies created by airing episodes like Elogium and Twisted completely out of order, and am also of the opinion that, although it would've been nice to have seen the 'closure' scene that was filmed for them in Fair Trade, Warlord works perfectly fine as the 'breaking point' for their relationship.

Warlord works perfectly fine as the 'breaking point' for their relationship.

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I totally disagree. In "Warlord" she was being controlled by an alien, so that doesn't count. Then based on dialogue in subsequent episodes we're supposed to believe they broke up for real but I guess we just didn't see it, or maybe what we saw was real. Sorry, that's not how I took it at all. Perhaps one could analyze it and show how it makes sense on paper, but that's no substitute for how it made me feel actually watching it unfold. It sucked. And where where was the big emotional breakdown from Neelix when Kes finally left for good in "The Gift?" Neelix was very selfish and child-like with his feelings and territorial over Kes, and to ignore all of that when Kes actually left was to ignore some potential growth for his character. There could have been some wonderfully emotional scenes with him there. In this case, they blew it.

Kes was under Tieran's influence, but, at the point she broke up with Neelix, she wasn't entirely being controlled by him, and the things she said while being influenced by him weren't just made up.

The Fair Trade 'closure scene' would've been a good coda to what happened in Warlord, but, from a writing standpoint, what happens in that episode (Warlord) is able to stand on its own and function as a decent 'breaking point' for their relationship.

FWIW, it didn't make any sense to me either. I figured Kes broke up with Neelix in "Warlord" to keep him out of the way for what was going to happen. Then the next episode happens and they're still broken-up. Major WTFage.

Kids, don't have your characters break up in the same episode where one of them is going to be possessed.